The book gives a historical approach to religion in the Donbas region from its early times to the present. It suggests thorough analysis of how religion interacted with politic on the one side and ethnic identifications of its inhabitants on the other in different periods of the history of Donbas. Historical background of regional specificity helps to better understanding the system of values and senses in contemporary Donbas – economically and socially the most depressive region in Ukraine – with the lowest level of religious self-identifications and irrelevant attitude to ethnic markers of the local population, instrumental use of religion by regional political class and oligarchs, and the highest rate in the country of new (quasi-) religious organisations and movements.